Café Crawl: Edinburgh

So my new lovely friend/ flat (room)mate, Hayley, and I did our own, homemade Café Crawl. This is an easy thing to do in Edinburgh (compared to Toronto) because the city is SO walkable and also FULL of charming, quality cafes. It spanned over a couple of days, as one can (or should) only have so many scones/hot chocolates/ teas/ smoothies/ lattes in one morning. But WHAT a success it was! (Sidenote: I also recently moved into a PERFECT new flat! Blog post to follow shortly.)

Mere steps from our flat in Marchmont, this homey gem is located right in the Meadows (beautiful park in the heart of the city). We walked in and only the owner, Amanda, was there. It felt like we were coming for coffee at her home in the greatest way possible. It was perfect. She cooked Hayley up an off-menu breakfast of scrambled eggs (with parsley), toast and tomatoes. I had a hot chocolate.

Sequinned seating at Pavilion

The vibe of the place is homey, eclectic, open and hippie. It is scattered with old books, sequinned pillows and crates of old records (£1 each). Stevie Nicks played softly and when we left, Amanda told us to find some crafty people to contribute to her winter craft fair in November. On a sunny day, families can be found enjoying local, organic treats on colourful lawn chairs out front.

II. The Old Town Bookshop, Victoria Street

The Old Town Bookshop, Victoria Street.

Okay, so obviously not a café but I could not resist telling you about this amazing place we popped into on our exploration of Edinburgh’s cafes. Small, intimate and FULL of Victorian editions of fiction novels, travel and history books (mostly Scottish)… I fell in love. Ironically, I bought a piece of Irish literature: a collection of Oscar Wilde’s plays for £1.50.

This place was quite perfect for so many reasons. Antique furniture, mix-matched china, delicious scones, amazing coffee and tea, and great music. AND CAKE! Oh my, the variety and elegance of these cakes are incredible. Plus (for you cafe loving students out there)… wifi! The atmosphere is great to snuggle in on a rainy day and read through the pile of Shakespeare.

Last, and certainly not least (sorry for the cliche), is FYUL Breadstreet. We were on our way back to Lovecrumbs, as we just LOVED it, when we stumbled upon this wonder. Wow. Stayed so long, I had two meals. For breakfast, a FRESH scone and a latte. The scone was served with fresh butter, heavenly clotted cream and raspberry jam. I die for all scones and this one blew me away. Coffee was perfection. Next meal was a chicken, vegetable barley soup served in a lovely tin bowl with two giant, fresh slices of homemade bread on a wooden slab. Have I mentioned the freshness of the food here? Please go! The atmosphere is similar to Lovecrumbs, though less intimate and more spacious. Keep your eye out for the sweater chair with buttons and elbow patches.

I’ll leave you with this great video for no reason other than to thank-you for reading all the way through (well actually it was also playing in Lovecrumbs when we went)! Lots of love!

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3 Comments

It’s great to hear from you! Fresh food is my thing. Bread, scones, coffee – all you really need (butter included, of course). I LOVED the video. That little beauty looked to me like a ginger version of you!

You’re blog is good, it distracted me from the work I had to do.
All this places look nice i should do one of the cafe crawl of my own, I’m sure there’s plenty of other great places like this! and if they’re still looking for crafty people in the first cafe, i can pop by, i hope she needs some knitters or croheters.